Rolls Razor Sharpness Issues, Plz Help

Hello,

I now got my rolls razor working, found a guy downtown that made me a strop for the rolls. Now its the hone I am having issues with. The hone is Brand new as far as rolls razors are concerned. It still have the Made In England Logo on it and is perfect, lapped and ready. The Problem is I cant seem to get a good shave worthy edge. the bevel is fine but I don't know what grit the stone is that it comes with. Should I use paste on a spare strop? Can they be honed off the razor? Anyone else have this issue with one of these?

Also the blade seems to want to 'Slap' the stone every time I 'Flip' the blade. Which cant be good for the edge either.
Any suggestions?

Thanks again,

James

What make is the hone? And do you know what grit it is?

Theres one of two possible problems with the hone here. If its a c.1k hone, thats really a bevel setter and you'll need to get some higher grit stones to get a decent shaving edge. Alternatively its a very high grit stone and all its really doing is polishing the edge, not sharpening it.

You need a range of hones from bevel setter up to polisher to get a good edge. So you might use 1,4,8 and 16k stones as a bevel setter, sharpener, polisher and finisher respectively.

Pastes work well as a final polish, but they wont make a dull edge shave worthy. I use paste after my 16k stone.

My advice would be to send the razor out to a pro for honing and learn to shave first, then get a second razor and a full range of hones later on and learn that skill. Trying to learn both at the same time is tough because you dont know how good your edge is.

If you have a shave ready pro-honed razor you'll know thats a good edge and you can use that as a benchmark for your own honing. Otherwise it can be a little bit like aiming blind..!

Good luck and keep us posted!

yes you can get a good edge with the rolls hone but i tell ya its going to take time figger on doing 1500 laps or more also when flipping the blade go very slow you should hear a ka ching 2 sounds the frist when the bail hits the stone and the when the blade slips thru the bail.i honed mine and now its shaving, but like i said it took many , many laps. you can pry the bail off and stick a chopstick into the large deep hole and the hone it like a straight razor on normal hones this is faster but the angle is not the same as the rolls sets it . i wanted to use it like it was made to be used so it was a whole lot of back and forth.if the back side of your new strop is smooth then paste the back side and then flip it over to strop on leather.
once you get her going shes easy to keep sharp and will give you a great shave i prefer my rolls to any DE razor i have used and find that only a straight razor will give me a better shave

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cutalot

yes you can get a good edge with the rolls hone but i tell ya its going to take time figger on doing 1500 laps or more

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+1 on this.
It takes long or even longer time to hone the blade if it wasn't honed before. In the end you will get yourself a real good shaver. I can't say about the grit of the original hone but i wouldn't get it into regular hone and so lose the original bevel angle.

that hone is not very good. it is a touch up hone and isn't meant for sharpening the razor in the fist place. that needs to be done like on any straight razor with bad edge - clean the chips and oxidation on the edge, establish a good clean and sharp bevel and then refine the edge with progressively finer hones.

Its not an ordinary razor, the hones are encased in the lid and I dont think I will be able to find varying grits to fit it.

Thank you tho, I will use that info for my st8.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cutalot

yes you can get a good edge with the rolls hone but i tell ya its going to take time figger on doing 1500 laps or more also when flipping the blade go very slow you should hear a ka ching 2 sounds the frist when the bail hits the stone and the when the blade slips thru the bail.i honed mine and now its shaving, but like i said it took many , many laps. you can pry the bail off and stick a chopstick into the large deep hole and the hone it like a straight razor on normal hones this is faster but the angle is not the same as the rolls sets it . i wanted to use it like it was made to be used so it was a whole lot of back and forth.if the back side of your new strop is smooth then paste the back side and then flip it over to strop on leather.
once you get her going shes easy to keep sharp and will give you a great shave i prefer my rolls to any DE razor i have used and find that only a straight razor will give me a better shave

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Thank you, I will try the Many Many laps and see how it goes. Yes the other side is smooth so i will CromOx it and see it that helps....after many many laps.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by James1983

Its not an ordinary razor, the hones are encased in the lid and I dont think I will be able to find varying grits to fit it.

Thank you tho, I will use that info for my st8.

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Actually I know what it is, I've played with them and honed and used a couple, and yes you'd likely have to find somebody to hone it for you if you plan on using it.
There are no hones of different grits that are meant to fit in the lid, the blade needs to be honed by somebody who knows how to hone.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cutalot

you can pry the bail off and stick a chopstick into the large deep hole and the hone it like a straight razor on normal hones this is faster but the angle is not the same as the rolls sets it

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This is wrong, if the device operates properly the angle is exactly the same. I have verified it on mine.

I've had a Rolls razor for many years and I used to shave with it a lot. The kit came with a tube of red paste for conditioning the strop. The hone is very smooth to the touch and is used dry. I found it difficult to get the blade really sharp. Be careful honing. Pull the handle slowly to keep the blade from slapping the hone hard which might damage the edge.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gugi

This is wrong, if the device operates properly the angle is exactly the same. I have verified it on mine.

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oh my if i had only known that sooner i would of saved myself a few blisters. 1500 laps is just a guess thou it went on for days untill i got it where it would give me a good shave.looking at it now if the bevel is the same wouldnt there be some hone wear on the spine? my bevel is nice and shiny but my spine looks untouched

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cutalot

oh my if i had only known that sooner i would of saved myself a few blisters. 1500 laps is just a guess thou it went on for days untill i got it where it would give me a good shave.looking at it now if the bevel is the same wouldnt there be some hone wear on the spine? my bevel is nice and shiny but my spine looks untouched

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The "machine" does all the work. It sets the pressure,
it sets the angle. If you open one side then the
handle will hone with a pushing motion, replace that lid
and open the other side it will strop/ polish with a
pulling motion. The spine never touches the hone
or strop.

The secret is to not slap the razor on the hone or strop
but like any razor flip it gently and push or pull it smoothly.

The hone when new is a little coarse perhaps 5K but polishes
itself.

The friction clutch that provides pressure on the hone and
strop should not need lubrication unless it has gotten gummy
from a previous bad lube job.

I once picked up a spare blade that had rust on it near the
cutting edge. I did lay the blade on a hone and grind the
edge on both sides down a bit to clean it up.

Do oil the blade and other obvious bits to prevent rust.

It might be fun to build a honing jig/ holder so a full stack
of modern hones could be used but that is not the Rolls way.

Also use care when snapping the hone side lid back down, making sure that the razor is positioned properly.

If the razor head is towards center, and not at the correct outer position of the box, the handle will be raised a little. If the lid is shut, the hone will get cracked.

the spine on my blade has flattening and using a marker is easy to check that it matches the bevel. It's possible that in some cases the hone piece is a bit too far away from the razor so that the spine doesn't touch the hone. But even in this case it's still faster to clean the edge and set a bevel matching the spine on a coarse hone and then using the supplied hone will just do a double bevel, pretty much the equivalent of using a tape.

I've looked at the edge under magnification and it became clear to me why I didn't like the edge off the supplied hone and strop nearly as much as when I honed the razor on standard hones and stropped it on regular strop. In the later case it shaved like a nice sheffield wedge, after using the rolls hone and strop it was somewhat duller and quite a bit harsher.

It's a bit of a pain to hone it without a jig though, I almost made one.

I have 3 of them and love it! But if it is not setup properly and is not sharp you will hate it. There are some wikis around that show you how to clean and refurbish the mechanism. It is time well spent and any unit out there that has not been maintained NEEDS to be done. Find someone like gugi who is familiar with the Rolls to hone it first. Once it is honed and the Rolls mechanism, strop and hone is refurbished, it can be maintained shave ready just using the enclosed hone and strop. You will get a great shave out of it... very close to that of a straight.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gugi

that hone is not very good. it is a touch up hone and isn't meant for sharpening the razor in the fist place. that needs to be done like on any straight razor with bad edge - clean the chips and oxidation on the edge, establish a good clean and sharp bevel and then refine the edge with progressively finer hones.

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I just received a Rolls that I bought on ebay for about $10. In looking around for more info, I found this thread. I was wondering if anyone had tried sticking with the built in mechanism, but putting progressive 3m abrasive films on the hone to get it sharper (with less work than 1500 passes)?

I did a quick search and found one mention of that on B&B

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ckot

I just received a Rolls that I bought on ebay for about $10. In looking around for more info, I found this thread. I was wondering if anyone had tried sticking with the built in mechanism, but putting progressive 3m abrasive films on the hone to get it sharper (with less work than 1500 passes)?

I did a quick search and found one mention of that on B&B

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That is a fine idea. To do it correctly you need a couple
of hone plates to make the progression easy.

Do inspect the edge and if necessary add "lots of tape"
and lap it on glass or some other flat base.

Give lots of attention to the strop. The factory strop paste
is rather coarse so do not reach too fine with film.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ckot

I just received a Rolls that I bought on ebay for about $10. In looking around for more info, I found this thread. I was wondering if anyone had tried sticking with the built in mechanism, but putting progressive 3m abrasive films on the hone to get it sharper (with less work than 1500 passes)?

I did a quick search and found one mention of that on B&B

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That would work, It's probably still faster to do the bulk of the work without the mechanism.
I've played mostly with stropping on various things.